The air race has come to Perth In Western australia. In what was described as an almost perfect day, myself and two hundred thousand other spectators turned out on the banks of the swan river to see the event for the very first time here in australia.

What a huge day. Perth put on a fantastic outing for this premiere event. The colourful and quick racing planes where an absolute buzz to watch as they roared across the sky performing almost immpossible turns and twists thru the array of "air gates" floating in the river.

The south perth foreshore was the best place to see the spectatule. At first I struggled to get a good viewing point having a huge problem getting shots thru all of the hat covered heads. But patients and a friendly smile saw myself work my way to an enviable location at the riverside so I was free to shoot all day at these great planes.

The air race will be back next year. As a photographer I can only recommend that you take Millimetres. And lots of them. I really struggled to capture the detail with my little 200mm F4 lens & 1.6x crop factor camera. You would be much better off with a zoom lens with 100-300mm or even 100-400mm to be able capture the action properly. get in early and grab a riverside spot in front of all the shade annex's and tall people with hats!